Kendall Tankersley
Biography
Sarah Kendall Tankersley (later Sarah Kendall Harvey) was a peripheral member of the Eugene-area Earth Liberation Front cell. She was arrested in Operation Backfire in December 2005, pleaded guilty in 2006 to three charges, and cooperated with federal prosecutors. Judge Ann Aiken initially sentenced her to 46 months in federal prison on May 31, 2007. After reopening the sentencing hearing, the court reduced the sentence to 41 months on August 3, 2007. The Ninth Circuit affirmed that sentence in 2008.
Operation Backfire was the multi-agency federal investigation that, between 2005 and 2008, prosecuted approximately a dozen members of the small Eugene-area ELF/ALF cell known to investigators as 'The Family,' which had carried out roughly twenty arsons and acts of sabotage in five western states between 1996 and 2001. After the December 2005 arrests, the defendants split into two groups: those who cooperated with the federal government — testifying against their co-defendants in exchange for substantially reduced sentences — and those who did not (Daniel McGowan, Marius Mason, Joyanna Zacher, Nathan Block, Jonathan Paul, Briana Waters, Joseph Dibee, Justin Solondz, Rebecca Rubin, and the late William 'Avalon' Rodgers). This entry is for one of the cooperating defendants. The Earth Liberation Prisoners support network has consistently distinguished between cooperating and non-cooperating defendants, and many in the radical-ecology movement do not consider cooperators political prisoners. They are included here because they served meaningful federal prison time.
The Ninth Circuit opinion filed August 12, 2008 affirmed her final 41-month sentence. It records her December 7, 2005 arrest in Flagstaff, Arizona, and explains that the court declined the terrorism enhancement under section 3A1.4 but imposed a twelve-level upward departure under section 5K2.0. Her criminal-history category was not increased to VI. The imposed 41 months is a sentence, and this opinion does not establish actual prison admission or release dates. She graduated from Humboldt State in molecular biology in 2004 and was pursuing medical school when arrested. Source: https://cases.justia.com/federal/appellate-courts/ca9/07-30334/920080811/0.pdf#page=1
